Patient care providers routinely dispense medication units for administration to patients in the course of providing health care services. In this regard, the dispensing and administration of medication units may require authorization by a governing regulatory body. The medication units may be prepared and/or otherwise dispensed by a pharmacy located at or otherwise affiliated with a given patient care provider or by third-party source(s). For example, many hospitals have an onsite pharmacy from which medication units may be dispensed after preparation at the pharmacy.
A number of factors may present logistical challenges to a patient care provider in fulfilling medication requisitions. For example, each medication unit to be dispensed by a given patient care provider may have a different associated fulfillment timing requirement to ensure timely dispensing and administration of the medication unit to the corresponding patient. Additionally, the scope of inventory needed for a pharmacy to accommodate a wide range of potential medication units may be difficult to maintain, particularly in relation to medication unit components having a limited shelf-life, demanding handling/storage requirements and/or otherwise experiencing supply shortages. Also, the preparation of certain types of mediation units necessitates specialized equipment, facilities and skills that may not be commonly available, thereby limiting sourcing options. Further, cost efficiencies may be unavailable to many patient care providers.
In addition to the foregoing, an emphasis on detailed record-keeping for medication units continues to grow in the healthcare field. Such record-keeping may entail the obtainment and storage of various data pertaining to the preparation and handling of medication units. In this regard, the administrative burden associated with such record-keeping continues to increase.
Currently, existing approaches for obtaining medication units largely entail source selection processes in which limited and/or static data is utilized to make a selection and/or in which sourcing selection options are otherwise limited.